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Was that a meteor?

Andrew Vreugdenhil was watching Star Wars on TV with his family in Peterborough at about 4:20 p.m. on Sunday when they heard an earth-shattering boom.

Could it have been a space rock hurtling toward Peterborough in honour of Star Wars Sunday?

Vreugdenhil, a chemistry professor at Trent University, didn’t think so. It sounded like the now-familiar frostquake, to him - only it’s spring.

His next guess?

“I thought a tree limb fell on our back room,” he said.

When he went outside to check, there was no tree limb. He only saw his neighbours walking around their yards, too, looking for the source of the noise.

They heard it, and others saw it: according to dozens of reports on social media, people across the city and across Southern Ontario noticed something streaking across the sky before it apparently exploded or impacted near Peterborough.

Was it a meteor? Tough to say: no experts were calling it one late Sunday.

The only thing known for certain was that it wasn’t an earthquake.

The duty seismologist for the Geological Survey of Canada, Honn Kao, said so over the phone from Victoria, B.C.

But the American Meteorological Society’s website reported a sighting of a possible meteor in Peterborough on Sunday. By 6 p.m., the society’s website said meteor status was pending.

“Some people said it was a sonic boom - it sounded like that,” said Peter Dawson, an astronomer and professor of physics at Trent University.

He thinks it was “quite likely” a small meteoroid exploding high in the atmosphere.

“Small” in this case means it probably measures anywhere from half-a-metre to a metre, Dawson said, and exploded with the force of 50 tonnes of TNT.

That’s small as compared to the meteor that exploded over Russia in February of 2013, he said.

That one blasted out windows and injured 1,000 people in the Russian city of Chelyabinsk. It exploded with the force of 500,000 tonnes of TNT, Dawson said.

Meteors are “not uncommon,” he added - but most occur over the ocean, where most people can’t see them. Dawson says only 30% of meteors happen overland.

In Buckhorn, amateur astronomer John Crossen - who owns and runs Buckhorn Observatory - didn’t hear or see a thing.

But he still had a theory: it could have been an early meteor in a meteor shower taking place this weekend.

The peak of that shower had been expected around 4 a.m. Monday, and Crossen says they often start during daylight.

“Either that, or it was just a hunk of space junk,” he said.

Rodger Forsyth, the president of the Peterborough Astronomical Association, said he was at a national telescope and astronomy show in Hamilton when the event occurred.

So he missed it. Too bad, said his wife Louise. She was home in Ennismore when it happened, and she heard it loud and clear.

“I thought it sounded like a dump truck’s box coming down without its hydraulics - it was a loud bang,” she said, adding that her three cats sat still on a bed with their ears perked up when the boom came.

It amused her that her husband was away shopping for telescopes when a meteor showed up at home. She says it was kind of wasted on her.

“I’m not even the least bit interested in astronomy.”

SPACE ROCKS

According to Peter Dawson, an astronomer and professor of physics at Trent University, these are the proper terms to use when speaking about meteors:

A meteor is the optical display in the sky

A meteoroid is the hunk of rock hurtling through space

A meteorite is the piece of rock once it lands

EARLIER VERSION

Unconfirmed reports indicate a meteor exploded over Peterborough Sunday afternoon after it was spotted streaking across the GTA.

What we know so far:

A fast-moving object was spotted over Toronto, Whitby and Oshawa, moving east.

Reports indicate it was visible from the 401.

As many as three loud blasts were heard in the Peterborough area at roughly 4:20 p.m.. Some people have reported seeing a flash of light west of the city.

CFB Trenton has confirmed the situation does not involve an aircraft, Pete Fisher of Northumberland Today reports.